


The Walker Inn

by Ninjaninaiii



Category: In the Flesh (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Christmas Fluff, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-06
Updated: 2015-02-06
Packaged: 2018-03-10 18:55:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3300125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ninjaninaiii/pseuds/Ninjaninaiii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for Intheflesh-art's 2014 Advent calendar. Kieren is a put-upon barista, Simon tries to flirt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Walker Inn

**Author's Note:**

> Amazing art by Cheesecake12 here: http://intheflesh-art.tumblr.com/post/106049534880/avent-calendar-december-23rd

 

Kieren turned up the music.

He’d already turned the music up two times in the last hour.

He didn’t particularly like the music.

It was Christmas-y and jingle-y and full of good cheer.

He’d heard this particular song being played on the radio just enough times today for it to have done a full loop from dislike to like to dislike, but he turned it up.

He turned it up and stared at the man playing his guitar.

And signing.

In the café.

Kieren turned up the music.

The man didn’t seem to notice. Kieren wanted to strangle him.

The group surrounding the man had been ‘congregating’ here every wednesday for the last two months, and every wednesday was the same. They bought tea or cake (only one item each, the minimum to be allowed a long stay in the café,) they talked (business-like, church-like,) and sang, or, the man sung, and the others listened. Then they talked in hushed voices, grinned at one another, then they left. Every wednesday for two hours.

The singing was coming to a close now, and the man’s group applauded, a couple of other tables joining in with a smattering of smiles and encouraging cheers. Someone commented on how much they prefered the acoustic guitar to the ‘guttural choking of a song’ playing on the speakers, but Kieren busied himself with cleaning the coffee grinder and refused to turn the music down.

Kieren didn’t know who they were, and the group seemed intent on keeping it that way. They seemed polite enough (live concert excluded,) please’s, thank you’s and tips flowing as freely as their smiles, but though they looked open and accommodating, something serpentine lay in the grins of one too many of the members.

The sound of voices rose, as did the clattering of chairs, then dimmed as the door chimed, marking the end of the the group’s meeting. Kieren reached for a clean dishcloth and the anti-bacterial spray, ready to do something with himself after a dry spell in work.

“I don’t believe I’ve introduced myself,” the man said from behind him, and Kieren turned on his smile. His parents may have been absent, but he still upheld their business policy: ‘a smiling worker is a smiling paycheck’.

“No,” Kieren agreed, holding the cleaning materials up so as to make the man move out of his way.

The man smiled, a small pull on his lip, contact-lens-brown eyes lighting up. He held up his hands in a fake surrender, taking a step back. “I thought I should apologize for my serenade-of-sorts.”

Kieren huffed, stuffing both bottle and cloth into his apron pocket so that he could grab plates and mugs and transport them back to the counter. He wiped the mugs and replaced them on their designated shelves, displayed the PDS sufferer-friendly ‘faux foods’ in their glass display case, and got to work wiping every inch of the tables. As slowly as possible.

“I noticed you’d turned up the music,” the man carried on, drifting along while Kieren had been going back and forth amongst the tables, and now residing on the arm of one of the sofas closest to the tables being scrubbed.

Kieren hmmed, refraining from glancing at him. ‘The customer’s always right’ had been plowed into his brain, but surely there was a clause somewhere about religion nuts playing weird holy music in your café, on your shift?

“Yeah… well.” Kieren repositioned the serviette and sauce stands in a way he hoped would translate well in proper British passive-aggressiveness. It implied such sentiments as ‘oh so you noticed but you weren’t inclined to stop?’, ‘who even uses the word serenade nowadays anyway?’ and ‘why do you do that pouty thing with your lips and why is it attractive’.

“It’s a lovely place, you have here.”

“Thanks.”

“Impressive, for the location.” The man glanced at the tentative sign in the window. ‘PDS-sufferer friendly’ swung just above the ‘open/closed’ sign. It was written on a piece of cardboard with a green sharpie, the words only visible in certain lighting. His dad had said ‘it was a start’, that they would get ‘something proper’ made up soon, but it’d been a year since Kieren had returned from Norfolk, and he’d not had the confidence to bring the subject up.

It had affected their sales. Of course it had, being Roarton, they couldn’t expect miracles, but they had every PDS-sufferer’s CV for miles around, and had gained the business of those who’d lost and those who’d re-gained during the rising, whose business, the Walkers asserted, was far more appreciated than anyone prejudiced enough to shun a café for fair rights.

“Yeah,” Kieren said again, elongating the exhalation so it ended like a sigh. “People were more critical when they thought we were trying to keep… y’know,” he gestured at himself, “a secret. So dad made the sign.”

“It’s an impressively invisible sign.”

Kieren snorted, warming up slightly. “Hey, I’ll have you know he’s impressed by his lettering. Ten quid says he’ll give you a discount if you praise his handwriting.”

“Ten pounds? That’s a confident bet.”

“You should see what he’s like any time anyone comments on ‘The Walker Inn’. He thinks it’s very punny. He forgets that Jem came up with it, and that I painted it...” Kieren indulged in a smile.

“Ahh, a family of artists.”

“I’ll have you know the whole place is handmade.” He dragged a chair back to pick up a screwed up napkin that had fallen on the floor. “Mum made the fake food and I painted the mural…” Kieren’s eyes darted to the large compass emblazoned on the back wall. The design was golden, solar, the needles patterned with William Morris-esque flowering.  “So any praise addressed to dad’s latent artistic ability would please him enough to last a week.”

“You painted it?” The man stood from his perch, passing the two only other customers in the shop so he could softly press a hand against the wall. “It’s beautiful.”

The words went straight to Kieren’s stomach. “Thanks.”

“Why a compass? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“‘Not all those who wander are lost’,” Kieren quoted, dropping his eyes to the table again, “Or something poetic like that. When I rose, my parents kept saying they thought they’d ‘lost’ me, that they could never ‘lose’ me again. So.” Kieren ended his ‘so’ with another sigh, squirting a copious amount of antibac onto the table. He lifted his eyes after a suitable amount of silence to find the man running his finger across the horizontal spike directing west. The man seemed mesmerised, and so Kieren was in turn.

The kitchen doors opened and the spell was broken, Kieren wiping the last remnants of imaginary crumbs from the table to return behind the counter and join a currently grinning Amy. She was tying her apron over her multiple layers and wouldn’t let Kieren drop her eye.

“When you’ve finished flirting,” she teased, quiet enough for the man not to hear, “I have done enough washing-up to last me a lifetime, all change.”

“I wasn’t flirting. I was unloading my angsty PDS backstory to an annoying stranger who’d been singing at me for an hour.”

“Er, he was checking out your a-r-s-e when you were leaning over to clean the tables.”

“Sod off, he was not.”

She grinned again, her silence provoking. “Security cameras never lie.”

Kieren had a sudden and intense burning hope that the café was not robbed today, and that his parents would film over the camera’s footage sooner rather than later. But he didn’t say so, opting to squint at her and move into the back. She winked, jostling him as he passed.

Amy leaned on the counter, chin on palm. She smiled into her fingers when Simon turned and found that Kieren has apparently apperated, his eyes sweeping across the café to find Amy staring. Simon licked his lips and stood a little straighter, embarrassed to be caught.

“His shift ended,” Amy beamed, not bothering to hide her outright amusement.

“Ah.” Simon nodded slightly, clenching and unclenching his hands, feeling pinned to the spot. “Right.”

Amy laughed, releasing him from her spell. “Typical,” she said to herself, adjusting the ‘local produce’ baskets on the counter.

Simon took the chance to return to his original table, pick up guitar and notebook and flee. He raised his hand as a goodbye at the door, pausing slightly before opening it. “Could you apologise for me again? For the music?”

“He’d have kicked you out if you were being a nuisance.” Amy puffed her cheeks out and blew a raspberry. “Now get out, Grandpa Romance.”

-

“His name’s Simon, he’s a poet, and he’s very romantic. The wedding aesthetic will be undead-pastel-farmer-artiste, and big jumpers will be mandatory.”

“Whose wedding, sorry?”

“Er, yours, obviously, Mr. Kieren Walker-Monroe. Here, he gave me his business card.”

“He has a business card?” The rectangle was a simplistic matte grey with ‘Simon Monroe, Poet,’ written underneath, with an e-mail address, website and phone number printed on the back. “When did you have time to find this out?”

“About three weeks ago, when I asked him to marry me.” Amy sighed, pretend-dreamily, patting Kieren on the back. “He said no.”

“You asked me to marry you three weeks ago.”

“What, was that jealousy in your voice? Can you blame a girl for trying? You’re both so cute.” She pinched his cheek, snatching the card back from Kieren’s hand.

“Hey!” Kieren made an attempt at grabbing it, but she spun out of his grasp.

“So you are interested,” she said in a sing-song voice, tucking the card in one of the various layers of clothing. “Well this information comes at a price.”

“No, I just- ...what price.”

“A very expensive one. That I will think of. Soon. In the mean time, I expect you to pine and be soppy and use those big eyes to imagine your adorable future together.”

Kieren elbowed her. She elbowed him back. A customer coughed and intervened before it could become a fully-fledged brawl.

-

Kieren was holding armfuls of plates and cups very precariously. The mandatory santa-hat was slipping down his head, the bobble blinding him in one eye. The café was at peak saturday-lunchtime capacity and the floor was a minefield of bags, feet and children.

Amy saw her opportunity. She glided up behind him and tickled under his outstretched arms. Kieren jumped, flinched, caught himself and glared at the crockery, willing every power in the universe to give him strength. “Amy,” he bit out.

“I’m a tickler! I can’t help it if my BDFF isn’t ticklish, I’ve still got to try.”

“For the seventh time, it’s physically impossible for me to be ticklish, please stop,” his annoyance turned-plead as Amy continued without heed. He managed to maneuver himself out of her grasp, pushing an armful of empty plates destined for the kitchen in her direction.

“Aw, you’re just bitter because your boyfriend isn’t around. Let the Christmas spirit wash over you and heal your lonely heart.”

“I don’t know who you’re talking about, and I’m busy Amy, and so should you be.”

“Oh, talking of, he just walked in.”

“What? Amy I-” She adjusted his hat with a grin, shoved the plates back to him, and pranced off to the kitchen. She high-fived Jem as she passed.

Kieren froze again as Simon took Amy’s recently-vacated place beside him, indicating the now verging-toppling tower. “Would you like any help with those?”

“No, I- I got it, thanks.” Kieren could see the hat slipping down his head again from the corner of his eye, so he tried to nudge it back in place with a flick of the head. This turned out to be a bad idea as its descent quickened. Plates, hat or conversation with Simon. He had to sacrifice one to the gods of destiny.

Simon exhaled a short burst of air, hiding his mouth behind a raised hand. “Sorry, I shouldn’t laugh. Here, let me-” He reached out and pulled the hat down so it sat more securely on Kieren’s head. “Is that better for you?”

Kieren nodded, knowing the wolf whistle he’d just heard came from two distinctly recognisable people, both of who were currently giggling in a less than innocent way. “Thanks- uh- yeah. Thanks. I’ve gotta- yeah.” He directed the plates away, pushing past a sniggering Jem and Amy. They made a horrific duo.

-

Wednesday rolled around without another sighting of either business card or owner, and with the Christmas holidays kicking in, even the usually dead (no pun intended) shift was thronging enough for there not to be space enough for the Simon-crew to sit at a single table. When Simon sat at a four-person table, watching his followers attempt to join him was like watching cats fighting for the last scrap of food. The losers slunk off in different directions, making little islands of evil-glares spread across the café.

Kieren shook his head, but at least there was no sight of the guitar, so there was that.

“Are they always like that?” Kieren’s dad was ever-so-surreptitiously glancing at the group every thirty-seconds or so, a trace of fear worrying his face.

“Yes dad, every week, they come in here, wreck everything, start food fights and loot the till.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “You know what I mean. You never know with…” He cleared his throat, glancing at Simon’s table. Two out of the four weren’t wearing their contacts or mousse. Simon looked paler than usual, but his eyes were still brown.

“The Irish? Dad, you can’t say that.”

Steve sighed. “I just don’t want any trouble is all, it would kill our business, so to speak.”

Kieren finished making a customer’s latte and stepped out of his dad’s work area, putting the mug on the old lady’s tray and taking her money. His smile was more forced than usual.

The congregation slowly trickled up to the till, ordering their empty mugs and plastic foods. One of the women who’d won a seat at the head table, a platinum blonde lady with matching skin and eyes cocked her head at Kieren and smirked. She took her empty mug with a cheerless smirk, took a ‘sip’ and wiped her lips, pronouncing every motion. “Delicious.”

“That’ll be two quid please.” Kieren kept his voice monotone and professional, willing his dad not to turn around from his post at the coffee machine, where he was currently humming ‘Jingle Bells’.

The woman slid two pound coins across the counter. “Merry Christmas.” It was the most intimidating festive greeting Kieren had ever received, and apparently this showed, if her predatory smile was anything to go by. He looked away, asking the next customer for their order, allowing the mechanical ‘Who’s next please?’ steer his brain.

“I’ll have the Walker Special, Grande, please.”

“Special Grande,” Kieren repeated, grabbing a mug and putting it on the counter, expressly not looking up at the customer whose Irish accent was definitely not a dead giveaway as to who it was. Not that the owner of the Irish accent was special in any way and deserved not being looked at, but nobody had to know.

“I apologise for Zoe’s behaviour,” the voice said, handing over a fiver.

“Who’s Zoe?” Kieren took the money and opened the till. He caught a flash of Simon’s smile.

“She doesn’t understand why some people find it necessary to hide behind contacts and mousse.”

“Doesn’t sound like you do, either,” Kieren dismissed, hackles rising. Closer now, he could see that Simon had only used a layer of mousse, a thin veneer of normalcy.

“No. ...Perhaps not.” Simon took his change, returning to his table and to a still-sneering Zoe.

The next customer ordered edible food and drink, letting Kieren concentrate on teaching his dad how to use the damned coffee machine for the umpteenth time.

-

With no circle-time to rally around, the congregation thinned out table by table this week. Simon’s table was last to leave, Zoe and her partner eventually standing when it was evident that Simon intended to stay, alone, for a while longer.

Kieren stared longingly at the kitchen doors, but Amy had chosen today to have a day off, and working at the sink meant working with Henry. As devoted as the kid was, to choose washing up was to choose at least two hours of the Jem Inquisition, an event he wasn’t prepared to suffer through quite yet.

Steve saw him loitering and threw a dishcloth at him. “Kier, can you clean the tables at the back, please?”

The tables at the back. The table that Simon was occupying. He sighed. “Yeah.” He started at the furthest corner from Simon, ferrying dishes and rubbish, cleaning tables, pushing in chairs.

“Have you finished with your plate?” Simon looked up from where he was crouching over his notebook, an intent expression on his face. He nodded, seeing who it was, and smiled.

“What’re you writing?” So kill him, it was tough finding liberal, attractive men in Roarton.

“Ah, just a schedule. Upcoming rallies and meetings. Boring, I know.”

“Huh.” Rallies sounded political. Meetings sounded official. “Amy said you were a poet so I thought…”

“You were having conversations about me?” Simon raised an eyebrow and Kieren smiled knowingly.

“Had to find out who else she’d proposed to, didn’t I? Fight off the opposition?”

“Oh.”

“Oh- no- I mean- no- we’re friends. Me and Amy. Friends. Best friends. People-think-we’re-dating-but-we’re-best-friends-friends. She liked me before, but then… I… broke up with my uh… boyfriend… so. Yeah. Friends.”

“Amy and I are friends too,” Simon clarified, looking up at Kieren. “Though I had no boyfriend to break up with.” After a moment’s pausing staring into one-another’s eyes, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his wallet, sliding a business card across the table.

“Ah, the infamous card makes its appearance.” When Kieren went to reach for it, Simon covered his hand with his own. His gaze was earnest and straight-faced, a world away from Rick’s vague-internalised distaste. Then Simon took his hand away and found his pen instead, tapping it against his notebook.

Kieren pocketed the card before some divine force could whisk it away from him again. Then, remembering where he was, he picked up the plate, waved awkwardly and half-ran towards the counter. He was pretty much in the kitchen before he realised he’d not explained the ‘infamous card’, nor said thanks, goodbye, I’ll definitely call you, let’s do more of the handholding, etc. He groaned inwardly.

“Was he giving you trouble?” Kieren was cut out of his self-pity by his dad’s concern.

“No, dad. We were having a normal conversation. Like normal people.”

“You can never tell with them folk. He’s the leader of that weird cult. I don’t trust him.”

“He’s a poet, dad, they’re harmless idealists.”

“What did he give you? Some kind of terrorist agenda?”

“He gave me his number, dad.”

“His number? What, why? Are you going to join his meetings?”

“Christ, dad. He gave me his number. We were flirting.”

Kieren counted seven seconds of buffering between his words and his dad’s understanding of said words. His mouth gaped. “Really? Him?”

“Oh my god, dad please no, no dating advice.”

“Do you want me to go and talk to him?”

“About what?? Jesus dad, would you do this with Jem?”

“Yes, of course, if I thought the man, or- I guess- person of any gender or walk of life- was a possible terrorist.”

“Oh my god, he’s not a terrorist. He writes poetry. He sings and plays acoustic guitar.”

Steve didn’t seem satisfied with it, but he let it go, washing his hands and drying them on his apron. “Just be careful, okay, Kier? We only just got you back. Don’t do anything that would make your mother worry.”

Kieren looked at the plate in his hand. “What, like be a gay, asexual PDS sufferer in Roarton?” He sighed at Steve catching his breath. “I’m going to switch with Henry.”

-

“No congregation today?” Kieren stood over a single Simon again, raising his eyebrows.

“They had something else planned.”

“And left you all by yourself? What kind of loyal following are they?”

Simon blinked then snorted, his ever-agape mouth closing so he could smile. The man seemed to spend half his time pouting, the other half like he was catching flies.

“More official plans?” Kieren tried to catch a glimpse of the page Simon was writing on, but he could only decipher a couple of words from the man’s shitty penmanship.

“No, these are my own. Lines for a project I’m working on.”

Kieren hummed, trying not to sound too interested, or too uninterested. He was about to ask if he could read it when the chair opposite Simon was dragged screeching across the floor, and a crabby-looking Zoe sat down in it.

“Get me a Special, would you, pet?” She handed him a couple of quid, patted him on the arm and shooed him on his way. If she was living, Kieren would have spat in it. Kieren returned with the empty mug, handing it to the woman with a smile and a “Can I get you anything else?” she dismissed him, but not without Simon shooting her a withering look.

-

“The ULA released the rabid rotters up at the GP last night.”

“The ULA? Here? Gives an old lady the shivers, it really does.”

Kieren handed the two ladies at the till their drinks, charging them extra. They were too busy nattering to notice.

-

“Aww, why’s Bambi so grumpy today?” Amy latched onto Jem’s side behind the counter, observing a grumpy Kieren occupying one of the café’s sofas. He had his laptop on his lap, reading with his jaw set in a frown.

“Mum and dad held an intervention at breakfast today. It started with the phrase: ‘We’re not homophobic, we just think....’ Then they went on about how they thought that lot of weirdos that come in with his boyf were the ULA, what with the GP and shit.”

“Ooh, that sounds painful.”

“Kier blew his shit. Mum and dad barely made it out alive, said they had to go up to the city, so he came here to mope.”

“What’s he reading?”

“I dunno, looked like angsty poetry when I looked over his shoulder.”

“Ho ho ho, poetry, humm,” Amy swished around the counter, skirts and pettycoats fluttering as she did. “Sooo? What do you think?” Amy dropped down next to Kieren on the sofa, snuggling close.

Kieren was looking very adamantly at his laptop’s background, no other program open. “About what?”

“About your future husband, silly. A little birdy told me you two have got to flirting”

“I would ask you how you knew everything, but that would imply you weren’t an omniscient god.”

“Don’t try to dodge the question with flattery, true as it is. Out with all the goss.”

Kieren closed the laptop, putting it on the coffee table in front of him, resigning himself to Amy’s conversation. “In the one minute I’ve talked with him, I’ve managed to fail at flirting twice, talk about Rick, cracked in-jokes he didn’t understand, and ran away. Twice.”

“Bless, you did wonderfully.”

“‘Wonderfully’? Amy, he probably thinks i’m an idiot.”

“You are an idiot. An adorkable idiot with an adorkable crush. He probably fell in love then and there.”

Kieren scoffed, folding his arms as if he could protect himself from her by doing so. “Yeah. Right.”

“Oh Bambino, don’t be so down, no-one can resist the biggest eyes in the galaxy or the fluffiest hair this side of an alpaca, especially not romantically-inclined, duck-faced jumper dorks like him.”

“I hate you.”

“You love me. You know who else love you? Smitten McGrandpa over there.”

Smitten McGrandpa had entered the shop, and looked worried. When he spotted Kieren, he visibly relaxed. This did nothing to dissuade Amy’s argument. “Oh, well would you look at that, so much washing to do. I’ve got to go and go do that. Play nice, play safe,” Amy winked, hoisted herself up and returned to Jem, who was chewing some gum in a vaguely menacing way. She bounced her eyebrows up and down, she and Amy entering a whispered conversation with one another.

Kieren followed Amy’s exit with his eyes, then turned to look at Simon. “Christ Simon- you can’t-” Kieren stood up. Simon wasn’t wearing mousse or contacts. “You can’t come in here looking like that after the other day…”

“You’re okay-” Simon was moving towards him, looking as if he’d been in a rush.

“Yeah? Why wouldn’t I be- Simon, what’s wrong?”

Simon shook his head. “Are your security cameras working?”

“Yeah?” Kieren was definitely definite about this. Not because he’d taken Amy’s advice and had watched the security camera footage of Simon looking at his butt (he had been). Definitely not. It was because he was very safety conscious. “What is it Simon, what did you hear?”

“It’s nothing, just rumours I’d heard.” He looked up at the various cameras and shook his head again, then double checked Kieren, as if he could be hiding secret injuries. “I’m sorry for disturbing you.” He smiled, then left without looking back.

Kieren stared after him, then turned to Amy and Jem, one eyebrow raised. They ignored him, talking behind their hands

-

Kieren woke up to the crash before the alarm went off. His stomach dropped as he scrambled to get out of bed, meeting Jem on the landing. She was wielding a baseball bat, of unknown origin. “Kier?” she whispered, sticking beside him in the dark.

“Do you want to stay here, Jem?” She shook her head, propping the bat on the banister so she could tie her hair back. When she picked it up again, he could see her hands weren’t trembling nearly as much as his. “Okay. We’ll just- we’ll just investigate, then we’ll call the police, okay?”

Jem nodded, facing the stairs. They descended into darkness, breathing irregularly but quietly. The door leading to the café was ajar, but not far enough to be able to see into it. Kieren pushed against it, gladder than ever they changed the hinges recently so it didn’t give a screech as it opened.

The café was dark and cold. There was a wind blowing through it. Eyes adjusting to the moon-lit darkness, Kieren could see one of the front windows had been smashed through, the other had ‘rotters’ sprayed onto it in red paint. Kieren couldn’t see anyone else in the café, but he looked to Jem for her sweeping observations. She breathed out, slowly and calmly, so Kieren calmed down too. He pointed at the lightswitch, and she nodded, so he turned them on. Behind him, he heard the dull thump of his dad coming down the stairs. His mum wasn’t far behind, pulling a dressing-gown around herself.

Jem was scouting out the shop now, checking behind walls, under tables, behind the cash register. The till itself was untouched. She went to the window, touching the words, her finger coming off wet with paint. She looked back at her family, then up at the security camera.”....Who did this?”

-

“And you’re sure it wasn’t your… Simon’s lot?”

“Oh yeah, very romantic, set your followers to destroy your loved-one’s livelihood. Then spray-paint self-abusive obscenities onto the windows. Great tactic, dad.”

“I’m being serious, Kieren.”

“So am I, dad. For the last time, Simon’s a poet. He leads a reading group. Would a terrorist lead discussions on wednesday afternoons about Jane Austen around cups of fake-tea? No. And speak of the ruddy devil, as ever.” For all his protestations, Kieren didn’t know. He didn’t know if Simon had done it. If Zoe and her cohort of non-compliants had been upset with the café’s you-sit-you-buy policy. If Simon was flirting as a cover.

“I heard the news, I’m so sorry.” Simon’s worry lines looked almost permanent when he wore the expression. “Is there’s anything I can do to help?”

“A new window would be great,” Steve muttered. They’d managed to get some boards to cover the gaps up, had swept away the broken glass, but the writing couldn’t be removed with either soapy water or bleach. Steve wasn’t optimistic about getting either of the windows fixed before Christmas. It was already the 23rd, and they didn’t have a good reputation with most of the ‘lads’ who did odd jobs because of Gary’s reign of bullying.

Simon nodded, saying something about ‘knowing a man’. He squeezed Kieren’s shoulder and left, looking both ways before deciding to hurry off to the left. By ten AM, they’d had three offers to have both windows fixed and cleaned up at reduced price, same-day, free installation.

When Simon returned around midday, Steve’s tune had changed dramatically. He almost hugged the surprised man when he ducked his head in to check whether anyone was in the shop, then pushed him in Kieren’s direction, all the while interspersing his words with excerpts of ‘Last Christmas’, the current tune on the radio.

“He seems happy,” Simon observed as he sat in the seat next to Kieren.

“Apparently the village started a donation fund so we could fix the windows for free. And the video caught the kids who did it. Some scumbag teens with nothing better to do, apparently.” Kieren had received one heck of an apology for the allegations of terrorism. He’d also not had to consider any further whether Simon was just using him and the café as a secret meeting spot for said terrorism. Kieren let his leg relax, touching Simon’s under the table.

“What’re you drawing?”

Kieren had his sketchbook out and was doodling with a pencil. “I was thinking about changing the Walker special.” He pointed at a couple of thumbnail designs. “They’re candles in mugs. You light them and they give off the scent of coffee or chocolate or maybe gingerbread and apple cinnamon in the winter- so we don’t just have an empty cup.”

Simon moved closer, leaning in as if he couldn’t see the drawings properly. “They’re beautiful sketches. You’re amazing.”

There was the clearing of a throat from behind them, and they both shot up, guilty at being so close. Amy and Jem stood grinning beside a bemused Zoe. It was strange to see them together. Amy looked like the devil, and both Jem and Zoe had their hands behind their backs.

“Uhm, hi?” Kieren ventured. He glanced at Simon to see his eyes widening.

“The rumours,” Simon said under his breath, mostly watching Zoe’s hidden hands.

“The rumours,” all three girls confirmed.

“The rumors?” Kieren asked.

“The rumours.” Simon looked like he was bracing himself for a harsh reality. Kieren flinched when Zoe revealed her burden. She raised it above them with the evil grin she reserved for special occasions.

“Mistletoe.”

Jem produced her present next, not showing what it was until she’d already applied it to Kieren’s cheeks. “Blusher because it’s no fun with a lack of blood flow, and we all know you’d be brighter than rudolph, Kier.”

“The rumours,” Simon repeated. “They were true.” He looked slightly shell-shocked, his eyes not leaving the mistletoe. He turned to explain to Kieren, about overhearing his book club’s happiness that he’d found someone he liked, about their plans to get them together, that they would use any means possible, including violence if needs be.

But Kieren saw the opportunity and he took it. He placed his hands on Simon’s neck and closed his mouth with a kiss, deepening it when Simon reciprocated. Jem and Zoe whooped like primary school kids seeing their first kiss while Amy prepared the third and final present.

As they pulled apart smiling, Amy magiced a bucket from beneath her skirts.

Smiles turned to dread, Simon and Kieren recoiling into one another as rice, confetti and glitter poured down on top of them, absolutely covering every inch in glittering madness.

“Let the honeymoon period begin!”

 

 


End file.
